CSBG Archive

Comic Book Legends Revealed #205

Welcome to the two-hundred and fifth in a series of examinations of comic book legends and whether they are true or false. Click here for an archive of the previous two hundred and four.

Comic Book Legends Revealed is now part of the larger Legends Revealed series, where I look into legends about the worlds of entertainment and sports, which you can check out here, at legendsrevealed.com.

Let’s begin!

COMIC LEGEND: The Hall of Justice is based on a train station in Cincinnati.

STATUS: True

Reader Squashua asked the other week about the design of the Hall of Justice and the design of Cincinnati’s Union Terminal. Reader Vinnie Bartilucci quickly stepped in with a link to an interesting piece on the subject.

In 1933, a massive train station opened in Cincinnati, based on the Art Deco designs of architects Alfred Fellheimer and Steward Wagner. Union Terminal needed to be a gigantic building at the time, because Cincinnati used to be a major port for shipping, particularly as a bridge between Northeastern and Midwestern shipping points.

Here it is in 2008…

Hanna Barbera (founded by William Hanna and Joe Barbera) sold their animation studio to Cincinnati corporation Taft Broadcasting Co. in 1967. Occasionally, workers from Hanna Barbara would travel to Cincinnati for corporate reasons, but mostly they stayed autonomous back in California.

In any event, in 1973, Super Friends debuted.

The design of their headquarters, the “Hall of Justice” was given to Al Gmuer, a background supervisor for Hanna-Barbera for decades.

And he came up with the Union Terminal as the basis…

Here’s Gmuer on the design…

Mine had more windows. In the long run, I hated that building. The way it’s designed, it was not easy to draw. I had nightmares about that damn building.

So there ya go!

Thanks to Squashua for the suggestion and Vinnie for the information and thanks to Alex Shebar for the quote from Gmuer!

COMIC LEGEND: Alfred was made thin because of the 1960s Batman TV Show.

STATUS: False

Reader George wrote in asking perhaps the first question involving my new book, Was Superman a Spy? and Other Comic Book Legends Revealed. He asked:

In the section about Alfred on the TV series, is it also true that they changed Alfred’s appearance to look more like Alan Napier?

The answer, George, is no – but not far from the truth.

When Napier took over the role of Alfred for the TV series, yes, he portrayed Alfred as a thin man.

And yes, when Alfred debuted, he looked like this…

However, while Alfred DID change, it was for the Batman FILM SERIAL, not the Batman TV SERIES.

In 1943, soon after Alfred first showed up, a Batman film serial started, with Alfred portrayed by veteran actor William Austin…

Soon afterwards, in the Batman comics of the later 40s, Alfred began looking like the Alfred we know and love today…

So close, George! So very close!

Thanks to George for the question!

COMIC LEGEND: Stan Lee made Roy Thomas take the “Big Three” out of the Avengers.

STATUS: True

Nowadays, we’re used to writers such as Dwayne McDuffie being told for a book like Justice League of America, DC’s premier superhero team, that he cannot use characters that he would want to have on the team, like big-time characters such as Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman.

Heck, Grant Morrison’s JLA seemed to have an imposed change to the roster every six months (“Sorry, Superman’s blue now.” “Sorry, Hippolyta is Wonder Woman now.” “Sorry, this guy is Flash now.”).

Well, such restrictions were in place for decades, such as when Marvel Head Editor Stan Lee passed on his self-imposed restrictions from himself to incoming Avengers writer, Roy Thomas.

Thomas wanted to write the bigger names, like Iron Man and Thor, but Lee stuck him with the current team, a mixture of “Cap’s Kooky Quartet” plus Wasp and Goliath.

Soon, though, even Captain America was off-limits to Thomas, as Lee wanted the Avengers to strictly spotlight the lower level characters from the Marvel Universe.

Thomas complied, and he did some great work with the Avengers, whoEVER he used, but he also made a point of bringing back the big names whenever he could, whether for a new member’s initiation…

or a wedding…

And once he was on the book for a long enough time, Thomas just decided to start ignoring the order, and he slowly but surely brought them back until he had all of the “Big Three” of Captain America, Thor and Iron Man on the Avengers again.

By then, Lee was fine with it (and who knows how involved he was by then, anyways).

Thanks to Chuck at Design Notes and Roy Thomas for the information (courtesy of this interview Chuck did with Roy). And I can’t mention Roy Thomas without plugging his awesome comic book history magazine, Alter Ego! Be sure to check it out!

m!ke

Brian Cronin

jazzbo

Got my copy of the book yesterday. It looks great. The back cover is even cooler than the front cover. Just flipped through it last night, didn’t get a chance to start reading it yet, but I will this weekend. I’m super jealous. COngrats again.

Brian Cronin

James

Sean

congrats on the book. it was a pain in the rear end to find at my local bookstore (their “computer database” said it didnt exist, then while wandering aimlessly through the store i was surprised to find a lone copy buried between volumes of Conan stories by Howard for some reason) but it was well worth it. i just started reading it yesterday and enjoy it very much. keep up the good work!

Apodaca

Citizen Scribbler

There WAS a Superpowers toy of the Hall, and it was awesome. It was one of the nicest Christmas gifts I ever got. Lots of neat little features, but a little unwieldy. Now, Doctor Fate and Hawkman had somewhere to hang out while Darkseid threatened to destroy Earth if Wonder Woman wouldn’t marry him.

Fred

Brad Smithee

I still like when the Avengers (pre-Black Panther and Vision) were down to 3: Goliath (whose powers were screwed and he could only shrink), Wasp, and Hawkeye. It only lasted one issue, but I really wish someone would do a miniseries with the Avengers in those tough days!

Squashua

Went to college in the Midwest, and visited Cincinnati often. I saw Union Terminal on the way to the airport once and freaked out. I picked up some post cards of it, took pictures, visited a few times, lived in Cincy for a few years after college, etc.

There really isn’t much spoken of the connection between Union Terminal and the Superfriend’s Hall of Justice. Even when you go there, there is nothing to acknowledge the homage, so I appreciate you elaborating on the connection, Brian.

I’m glad to finally find out the history behind why Union Terminal was chosen as the design for the Hall of Justice.

Squashua

Dark Flash (Walter West / Alternate Universe Wally), John Fox (Future Flash) and Golden Age Flash all replaced the Wally West Flash at some point during Morrison’s run on JLA, but not necessarily within the pages of the JLA book.

Morrison even worked on an issue or two of the Golden Age Flash comic interaction, where he used the opportunity to plant Johnny Thunder’s pen (containing Thunderbolt in the ink) into the hands of Jakeem.

Sijo

I always liked the Hall of Justice for looking realistic, like something that people would actually design, unlike that weird satellite headquarters the League used for decades. (Though the latter was more practical, I admit.)

Wasn’t there a story that mentions that Alfred went to a weight loss resort specifically so he’d be more fit to help Batman and Robin?

As for removing the “big guns” from a team book like Avengers, while I agree that specific plotlines from other books should be accounted for, characters should not be removed without good reason. Having Superman stay in the League with his electric powers makes more sense than saying “Oh, he’s learning the ropes again, so he feels he would be a hindrance” or somesuch. (Though I do agree team books should focus their characterization on the characters who don’t have their own titles- which includes not just the Big Ones, you know- so as not to clash with other existing interpretations.)

Related to the above matter: I remember a JLA story where Superman is shown wresting an (evil) angel, and the Flash remarks on how awesome that is. Except at the time, Superman had his electric powers instead, meaning he did NOT have Superstrength anymore- was this an error due to a last-minute art correction?

Darrell Hempel

I moved to Cincinnati ten years ao, and the first time I saw Union Terminal, I thought, “huh . . . the Hall of Justice.” Never occurred to me that Union Termial actually was the inspiration for the HOJ!

Squashua

“Related to the above matter: I remember a JLA story where Superman is shown wresting an (evil) angel, and the Flash remarks on how awesome that is. Except at the time, Superman had his electric powers instead, meaning he did NOT have Superstrength anymore- was this an error due to a last-minute art correction?”

According to Wikipedia (urgh), he still had a fraction of his strength left. Considering Electric Blue Superman could reduce his density, one would surmise he could also increase his density and therefore, could have the equivalent of Super Strength.

Squashua

Holy cow, Brian. I just realized I came up with that question about why it was an homage a few weeks back, but coincidentally that Cincinnati Enquirer article you linked (just read it) was published in late March. Strange coincidence.

I just watched that Batman serial last week. I believe it also introduced the Batcave — called the Bat’s Cave in the serial — which consisted pretty much of a desk with a big bat symbol behind it. But hey, it even had the grandfather clock entrance — although it also had Batman working as a government agent through coded letters addressed to his civilian identity(!) in Los Angeles(!!).

Unfortunately, the whole thing is filled with some cringeworthy stuff about the Japanese, which is probably why the postwar sequel serial gets revived more often.

Just picked up your book (in the Toronto area… the local chain store was well stocked with about 1/2 dozen copies).

Re: skinny/fat Alfred. It is also interesting to not that “fat” Alfred remained the canonical Earth 2 Alfred up until COIE (even though he trimmed down relatively early in his comic book life) — this is kind of similar to the way Jim Gordon was always depicted in his 1950’s version in most 1970’s/80’s earth 2 stories.

Fr. Dan Graves

Anonymous

The discussion of the restrictions on using Marvel’s bigger name characters in THE AVENGERS reminded me of the fact that in the original, 1940s Justice Society, nobody with his/her own book could be an active member. This lasted until the split between A;LL-STAR’s publisher, All-American Comics, and National Periodical Publications (precursor to DC Comics) in about ’45. THAT brought a question to my mind: Does anybody know of so much as a single instance during that time of NPP doing ANYTHING with an AAC property beyond running ads for their titles? I don’t, obviously, but I’m quite open to having missed something.

Sean

“Wait… was there a Flash replacement under Morrison’s run… or was that a reference to something else?”

Yes and no. There’s a story in ‘Strength in Numbers’ where the JLA have to stop crazy old Bruce Wayne who, according to Batman, is responsible for a bunch of bad stuff [actually, Batman just wants to catch the imposter]. In that story, yes, there is a Flash replacement (not sure who, but Superman is told who he is).

But that story is one of Mark Waid’s fill in issues, not one of Morrison’s.

I was surprised to find, now that Morrison’s “Flash” issues are being collected, that there’s no crossover; I would’ve thought we’d see Flash with his leg in a cast somewhere in JLA.

eric scheidt

Re: skinny/fat Alfred. It is also interesting to not that “fat” Alfred remained the canonical Earth 2 Alfred up until COIE (even though he trimmed down relatively early in his comic book life) — this is kind of similar to the way Jim Gordon was always depicted in his 1950’s version in most 1970’s/80’s earth 2 stories.

Yeah, that was pretty common. Luthor went bald very early on in the 1940s (probably originally as an error, but one that stuck), but his original red-haired look became the Earth-2 version. Alan Scott was using what would become Hal Jordan’s oath for years, but always stuck to his original oath after Hal came along.

Bob

Anonymous; Wonder Woman appeared in JSA while holding down her own book. She was the exception to the rule.

Also, in pre-Crisis JLA Flash(Barry Allen) had a romance going with Zatanna. Meanwhile, in his own book he was engaged to and planning a wedding with Fiona Webb who, as of her wedding day, did not know Barry was Flash. This indescretion was never dealt with in either book…though it might be why the JLA got exiled to Detroit without the heavy hitters.

Bob Hughes

The infamous 1940’s split that brought Flash and Green Lantern back to the Justice Society was between All-American Comics and Detective Comics. National Comics was formed after the two companies got back together again in 1947. And National Periodical Publications didn’t come into existence until the company went public on the stock market in 1961. And of course the company finally became DC in 1976! (or maybe it was 75).

Squashua

Brendan T

I’ve almost finished the Superman portion of the book. Bit disappointed that you didn’t use the same “rumour, true/false, explanation” format you do here, but the way you seague the information makes for a better book, I guess. It’s still the same kind of super interesting, well written content I get from here otherwise so it’s all good.

Squashua

Anonymous

Bob Hughes: Even if I did get the company names chronologically confused (and I KNOW it was National Periodical Publications, Inc., not National Comics, so forgive my taking a grain of salt), my question as to whether or not they ever made use of an AA property stands. If the arrangement was not a two-way street, that would raise a lot of questions in my mind. Anybody?

Bob

Nope. Tina McGee was a married woman Wally was involved with early in his first series. The accident that killed TV-Tina’s husband mearly turned comic-Tina’s husband into a crazed speedster-villian. With Wally’s help she cured him, then left Wally to go back to him.

Buttler;

Cad indeed. As I posted earlier, comic-Barry was getting his spandex-wearing freak-on with Zatanna in Pre-Crisis JLA while planning a wedding to the girl next door in his own book. Everyone thinks that Barry was the nicest of all super-heroes but when it came to women he was a real dick!

Sijo

“According to Wikipedia (urgh), he still had a fraction of his strength left. Considering Electric Blue Superman could reduce his density, one would surmise he could also increase his density and therefore, could have the equivalent of Super Strength.”

Ehh, sounds like a handwaving to me, but, it doesn’t really bother me. I would just like to know if the JL story with the angel was written before the powers change and Superman was supposed to be his normal self in it, but got “corrected” at the last minute. Morrison doesn’t sound like the kind of writer who would overlook something like that.

jefhamlin

Andrew Rubio

I bought your book at LAX yesterday and read through the DC portion during my flight to St. Louis. Great stuff! Very well researched! Can’t wait to finish it and I definitely can’t wait for a follow-up book!

Saw a copy of the book at work tonight (I work evenings in the music department of a Barnes & Noble). Prominently displayed at one of our front tables, I might add. Looks great, Brian! I promptly put it on hold to buy in a day or two.

On Alfred:

He was revamped to look like William Austin in the comics, with the explanation that Alfred was sent off to a health spa where he lost a ton of weight. The character was killed off around 1964 or so, early in the Julius Schwartz era. He was crushed by a boulder in the process of saving Batman & Robin’s lives. The comics then brought in Dick Grayson’s Aunt Harriet as a replacement character for Alfred. When the Adam West show used the Alfred character in addition to Aunt Harriet, they resurrected Alfred in the comics, as well. A scientist transformed the not-dead Alfred into the Bat-villain The Outsider (Batman found a cure, of course).

Here’s an idea, Brian: I’ve heard that the sarcastic, dry wit Alfred that Frank Miller introduced in Dark Knight & Batman: Year One was based upon John Geilgud’s butler character in the movie Arthur. It seems pretty obvious, but has Frank Miller ever explicitly confirmed this?

Bob

Aunt Harriet was brought in to protect Batman comics from accusations of promoting homosexulity, which at the time was almost as bad as being Communist. At least as far as Senetor McCarthy and Dr. Wertham were concerned.

When the heat was off Aunt Harriet was booted out of the manor and continuity.

Woody

Bob: I heard that about Alfred too: that Julie Schwartz was wary about 3 men living in the same house post-Wertham (although this was now 9 years after the whole Wertham/CCA saga).
So what about the rest of the 50s and early 60s? Were people so switched off by the dumb sci-fi/aliens/Batman transformation storylines that they couldn’t care less about the Alfred/Bruce/Dick situation?
Did Schwartz mention this in interviews? Anyone?

Anonymous

(I am sick and tired of this damned computer not scrolling during cut-and-paste!)

Bob Hughes pointed out Johnny Thunder stories in WORLD’S FINEST COMICS as an AA character being used by DC/NPP. And Jefhamlin suggested that Scribbly might have also appeared over there. Still, I have to wonder why AA (apparently) got so much more use of DC/NPP’s properties than vice versa. Seems to me that there’s an untold story there.

Bob H. also wrote: “A quick look inside the cover of any Superman-DC/National Comic published between 1947 and 1961 will settle the matter of the non-existence of National Periodical Publications prior to the later date.”

Since the question is whether or not the name was used well before the EARLIER date, I don’t see how that works. After all, the name Marvel was used between Timely and Atlas (according to at least the 2003 edition of OVERSTREET), not merely from the early 60s on. Sorry, but I don’t see it. If you can explain, fine.

Kamino Neko

My point is, they should have made her a servant, or a relative of Bruce, or something other than a relative of Dick’s so that the ‘why was this poor orphaned kid stuck with the stranger rather than his living relative?’ aspect didn’t come up.

Re: the Avengers: I think a strong writer can do wonders with 2nd-stringers who aren’t constrained by what is happening in their solo title. Roger Stern’s Avengers are some of my favorites. He made me care about such C-listers as Black Knight, Doctor Driud, and (female) Captain Marvel. He even developed the Wasp from a flighty, annoying character into a strong woman who could lead the Avengers.

john

Hah! I knew the Hall of Justice was based on Union Terminal! I have lived in Cincinnati my whole life and every time i see Union Terminal I tel everyone it looks like the Hall of Justice from Superfriends and they tell me i am crazy….well…i am, but that is beside the point…

Kamino Neko

Re: the Avengers: I think a strong writer can do wonders with 2nd-stringers who aren’t constrained by what is happening in their solo title.

Another, perhaps more striking, example is the Giffen/DiMatteis Justice League – initially, all big headliners except Batman and Green Lantern were off-limits, so they deliberately chose a second string Lantern, and made a very good, and very popular, team book composed almost entirely of B and C list characters.

Bob

At the time Giffen’s JL started Blue Beetle and Booster Gold were both headlines as each had thier own monthly series. However, Giffen was not obligated to make them behave the same way they did in thier own books.

Also, at the time Guy Gardner wasn’t the second-string GL, either; he was the official Green Lantern of Earth at the time. (If I recall correctly; I know it changed a lot, back in the day, as there were a lot of things in flux, what with the Guardians going away, coming back, going away, coming back…)

If you look at the characters involved in the initial Giffen/DeMatteis Justice League, almost all of them had their own series at the time. Superman wasn’t in it because of Byrne’s contractual agreement with DC at the time, and Wonder Woman was considered “new” to the DC Universe then, but they had what were considered big names apart from that.

As a kid I ( when I say “I” I mean the gang of kids that used to hang out at the comic store every weekend) was once told by my local comic book store owner that Howard the Duck #2 was rare because a delivery truck carrying thousands of copies got into an accident on the Brooklyn bridge and the copies were destroyed in the resulting fall into the East River.

Dan

JB Grantham

In the screen tests for Adam West and Lyle Waggoner for the Batman 60’s tv show, Aunt Harriet is referred to as “our housekeeper, Mrs. Cooper”. I thought that was interesting, as the show was still in the casting process, and apparently the producers had not yet decided that she would be Dick’s “Aunt Harriet”. Alfred is not even mentioned in the screen test scene; it’s possible that Alfred was not a character on the show at this point in production.

wwk5d

“Also, in pre-Crisis JLA Flash(Barry Allen) had a romance going with Zatanna. Meanwhile, in his own book he was engaged to and planning a wedding with Fiona Webb who, as of her wedding day, did not know Barry was Flash. This indescretion was never dealt with in either book…though it might be why the JLA got exiled to Detroit without the heavy hitters.”

Quick, someone alert Geoff Johns so he can retcon that before it soils Barry Allen’s saintly reputation!

Fraser

I don’t count Tina as Barry’s girlfriend in the TV show: They had exactly one kiss and came off much more like hero/sidekick. She did get a little possessive when PI Megan Lockhart started sleeping with Barry but that seemed as much about not being the only one trusted with Barry’s secret.

Bob

I think if Flash had more than one season the relationship with Tina would have developed, much like on Lois & Clark. Unfortunately, CBS put the show in a timeslot that seemed designed to kill the show quick!

[…] week, in discussing how the various film and television versions of Alfred (Batman’s butler) have af…, commenter Buttler remarked: We have Lynda Carter to thank for ending the powerless I Ching era of […]

Mateo

Just spent the last two days reading your whole archive. Very cool. I have a couple for you, although I am not sure if they exactly qualify.

1) Dave Sim has mentioned in a couple places a planned issue Cerebus #301, to be created by the Swamp Thing team of Alan Moore, Steve Bissette and John Totleben. He states that the issue is dead in the water due to a “Don’t darken my door” sort of situation between those three or some such. What was/is the status or plan behind that proposed issue? I thought it sounded like a great idea.

2) Warren Ellis has stated he got an established penciller fired off of one of his earliest Marvel jobs for deviating from his script. I have guessed this may be Doom 2099, but I just don’t know enough about Marvel to know. Seems extreme, especially if it was a 2099 property.

I hope these are helpful. I am especially interested in Cerebus #301, so I hope you find something interesting out.

Mateo

[…] Nevertheless, it’s a mildly interesting historical curiosity — this is the first appearance ever of the Batcave, an idea the comics promptly stole for themselves right down to the grandfather-clock entrance. Also this is the movie that prompted the comics to slim down the originally plump Alfred the butler to match his screen incarnation, as played by William Austin (Brian tells you more about that here.) […]

taffysaur

Squashua:-
Yeah, Linda Park was on the show quite often, but she was just “The TV News Reporter”. She was at the scenes of crimes and stuff sometimes, telling her camera (and thus the audience) what happened here.
She had no connection with The Flash or Barry Allen though.

Interestingly enough though, when the series begins, Iris is Barry’s girlfriend. She breaks up with him within that first episode (for his pathological tardiness of course) to kind of set up his bad luck with women.
She even comes back more than once, and we remember who she is. I don’t know why they (clearly) deliberately chose Tina over Iris for the show. Maybe just ’cause they needed someone they could turn into a scientist.
(Or even better, was she a scientist in the books? I don’t know her outside the show.)

ASD

Hi there, I’ve been reading these articles and have greatly enjoyed them and the information they offer (I plan on getting the book too someday).
I’m just wondering about something though…did they really replace Wally West as The Flash? I’ve read Morrison’s JLA run and really love it, but I don’t recall Wally nor Kyle ever replaced by other people as Flash or GL. Was that just a random comment?

During Morrison’s run, Wally was briefly replaced by a double from an alternate universe who turned out to be bad news, but that was in his own comic. This “Dark Wally” may have shown up in Morrison’s JLA (I don’t remember whether he did or not), but if he did it would have just seemed like Wally was acting a little unusual.

M-Wolverine

I hate to have everyone have a “new message” message just to say this, but I have to say finding the “real” Hall of Justice was one of the most awesome Legends yet. That’s so cool, and the picture is great.

So to make up for it, for those who were wondering about the Superpowers Hall of Justice, here it is in all it’s glory-